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What materials did you use?quilting fabrics purchased at a fabric shop

I made this a while back before class. after taking your class, what I see wrong is that the lighter brown around the border should switch with the brown in the middle. to achieve some depth I should have begun with the dark colors and then moved lighter and greyed. with the white being the bright.... there's no place to go. I am so rigid!!! this bloomin pattern has rules... for color selection of the 8 fabrics. and I thought I followed them and I was still not happy...

Hi Virginia,
Thank you for sharing your quilt. Blooming Nine-patch is one of my favorite designs. You can play so well with value in this design. Don't worry about trying to create depth in this design. This is a design that features luster---the movement of value going from light to dark (or dark to light or light to medium or medium to dark, etc.)
Your quilt's center is beautiful in its value play. Your disappointment is probably in the fact that the rest of the quilt appears as if it's all in the same basic value. Perhaps close up you could see differences, but from afar these differences disappear. The value finder is a key to helping us see if colors are moving in value.
I like to play with value in my designs. I use graph paper to scribble different value ideas for my quilt. I like to use watercolor pencils for this, but regular colored pencils are fine. I may do 2-4+ different versions, playing with the values in different ways. Then I choose the one I like best. This is more fun than following someone else's ideas. What's a great benefit from this playing is that you begin "feeling" the design. It becomes part of you because you have been working with it and its beginning process. You know it really well. Then as you work, begin where you feel the most comfortable and work last in the areas that you are most unsure of. If things don't seem to work as you plan, make changes. I almost always end up varying my designs from what I do on paper, because fabric plays differently. Allow yourself to make changes. Play with value change again, but do it on a smaller project. Play with it in different ways. Give yourself some luster experience with value.
Let me know what you think. Joen

thank you for so much of your time . I have ordered your class materials.. I actually never thought of the same value as being the problem... but of course... it is... how do you do this??? I mean... do you buy a quarter yard of fabric and bring it home and cut it up to audition it ? and then go back and buy more... ... so the bloomin nine patch system provides a bridge ( like you mentioned in sojurn's comments) but it doesn't override the value change needed.

I audition fabrics without any cutting----just what I have of the fabric.
Generally I purchase fabrics that catch my eye when I go to a fabric store. They are added to my stash of fabric colors. Sometimes I purchase fabric for a specific project, but most often I pull fabric from my stash. If I have color "holes" and don't find everything I need there, I head for the fabric store.
By paying attention to the colors that pique my interest when I visit a fabric store and buying 1/3-1/2 yard of each (usually), I build my color options. This can enrich the beauty of a project.
When you decide to work with certain colors, begin adding fabrics of these colors into your stash. Be sure that you don't purchase only "Miss America" feature fabrics, but you are also purchasing supporting-role fabrics. If you need a yard of a green fabric in your quilt, use 3-9 + fabrics to equal the yard. These fabrics should be similar in their coloring, but vary slightly in tonality, value, texture, etc. This will provide a beautiful richness to the green.
Does this make sense? Let me know how this works.....and/or what problems confront you.
Enjoy enriching your quilts.
Joen